Immigration Lawyer Leon Wildes Dies At The Age Of 90!

Leon Wildes: Lawyer Leon Wildes passed away on Monday, January 8, at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York. In the early 1970s, the renowned pair successfully resisted the Nixon Administration’s relentless attempts to deport them. Wildes stood behind Lennon and Yoko Ono in court, in public, and on television. He was ninety years old.

Leon Wildes Death

Englewood, New Jersey Mayor Michael Wildes, his son, made the announcement of his passing. During the three-year legal dispute, Wildes appeared with the Lennons on a number of prominent TV discussion shows, sharing at least a little portion of the couple’s enormous renown.

Following the Beatles’ dissolution, Lennon and Ono—both vocal opponents of the Vietnam War—moved to New York City, where the Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Nixon Administration quickly pursued them. Lennon had been convicted in London in 1968 on a marijuana possession conviction, and a waiver he’d received was ready to expire.

Over the course of a three-year court struggle, Wildes would unearth proof that Nixon’s attorney general, John N. Mitchell, had been persuaded by conservative South Carolina senator Strom Thurmond in 1972 to have the Lennon family expelled from the nation. Mitchell had then sent the request to immigration officials.

Leon Wildes Early Life

Born and bred in Pennsylvania, where he graduated with honors from Olyphant High School, Wildes earned a bachelor’s degree in New York from Yeshiva College, earning a magna cum laude degree.

Jerry (Jerome) Wildes, his brother, attended medical school after serving in the US Air Force. Leon graduated from New York University School of Law with a J.D. and an LLM. He was Treasurer of the Yeshiva College Board in addition to serving on the Board of Overseers.

Leon Wildes Career

As a Migrations Specialist for the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society in 1959, Wildes focused his attention on matters pertaining to immigration and refugee law in the United States. He was an honorary director on the HIAS Board of Directors.

With a focus on US immigration and nationality law, Wildes founded Wildes & Weinberg P.C. in 1960.

The Elmer Fried Prize for Excellence in Teaching Immigration Law and the Edith Lowenstein Award for Outstanding Contributions in the Field of Immigration Practice were given to Wildes. At the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, where he taught law as an adjunct professor, Wildes created the immigration law course and has since led Cardozo’s active involvement in the immigration law community.

For his successful defense of former Beatle John Lennon and his artist wife, Yoko Ono, against their deportation procedures initiated by the Nixon government, Wildes received a great deal of praise. As a result of his treatment of the Lennon case, Wildes provided five whole law review papers on the topic of advances in U.S. immigration law.

He learned about the government’s covert practice of giving deportable immigrants non-priority status in order to prevent their removal in situations where there is merit while working on the Lennon case. He has influenced the creation of this legal remedy, which is now known as prosecutorial discretion or deferred action. Under this program, law-abiding citizens who are elderly, gravely sick, or experiencing extreme poverty can stay in the country and escape deportation.

In 1970, Wildes presided over the American Immigration Lawyers Association as its national president. Among the numerous well-known people that make up Wildes’ clientele are John Lennon and Yoko Ono, whom he successfully defended against deportation from 1972 to 1976.

Wildes co-produced Mark St. Germain’s off-Broadway production “Ears on a Beatle” portraying the monitoring of John Lennon by the FBI at the time. In addition, Wildes frequently attended news conferences with his clients, spoke with Lennon in an interview with Tom Snyder on The Tomorrow Show, and made an appearance in the documentary The U.S. vs. John Lennon, which centers on this chapter of Lennon’s life.

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